Comments on: Mine eyes have seen the glory; we are as gods!http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2012/11/mine-eyes-have-seen-the-glory-we-are-as-gods/
Wed, 04 Dec 2013 06:45:00 +0000hourly1https://wordpress.org/?v=4.4.5By: ohwillekehttp://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2012/11/mine-eyes-have-seen-the-glory-we-are-as-gods/#comment-48583
Wed, 21 Nov 2012 20:48:47 +0000http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/?p=19107#comment-48583“I want to take a step back and also observe that this whole argument rests on a false historical premise: that modern conservative Protestant fundamentalism was the Christian orthodoxy for the past 2,000 years. It is not. It was not.”

Christian Protestant fundamentalism and modern Islamic fundamentalism closely coincided with movements in which purportedly divinely inspired writings which were previously interpreted predominantly by clergy with formal theological instructions who received doctrinal interpretive glosses together with their plain readings of these documents were superseded with direct, uninterpreted, gloss free readings of the same core texts (without supplemental works from “the tradition”) by rather ill educated laymen.

This upset the intellectual structures and concepts that kept troubling or problematic readings in check either by reinterpreting or de-emphasizing them.

]]>By: Scotthttp://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2012/11/mine-eyes-have-seen-the-glory-we-are-as-gods/#comment-48582
Wed, 21 Nov 2012 18:52:48 +0000http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/?p=19107#comment-48582Razib says: “True, there has always been a strain of Christianity which was naively literalist, but for most of the history of the religion the fixation on the Bible as science manual would have seemed somewhat strange, in part because science did not truly exist… and the battle between science and religion in this case is a clash of two moderns, not a modern an ancient.”

I think the statement that “science did not truly exist” is the key here. Until the 19th century, scientific investigation (ie, evaluation and discovery of the natural order) was primarily a theological endeavor, a means to find out more about God. Newton was a prime example. Only after the Enlightenment did people even start to consider evaluating the natural world outside of a theological context. This was the beginning of what we would call “modern” science.

This separation occurred for a reason. As more information about the natural world became available, the data lead people away from the theological context.

The literalists that you refer to are the ones who still believe that science should not have been separated from theology. But the reason why “the battle between science and religion in this case is a clash of two moderns” is because science left religion.

]]>By: marcelhttp://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2012/11/mine-eyes-have-seen-the-glory-we-are-as-gods/#comment-48581
Wed, 21 Nov 2012 17:02:01 +0000http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/?p=19107#comment-48581Many elements of the Democratic base accept without too much grumbling the social liberalism of the party’s political elite. Could it be that much more difficult for conservative grassroots to accept that the conservative elite accepts modern science?

To be a bit cynical and simple, the deal between the base and elites in the Democratic party is “We will support the social liberalism of the elites in return for their supporting policies that help the economic and material well-being of the less prosperous” (although this latter has frayed considerably since FDR and LBJ). The deal in the Republican party is “We will support policies that help the economic and material well-being of the most prosperous in return for their support of the social conservatism, esp. with regard to issues of sex and the role of women, and to a lesser extent, race.” With so much of the justification for the attitudes about sex and women based on a particular understanding of religion,[1] anything that calls into question 1 part of its received wisdom threatens the whole thing. So, to answer the question, it probably is much more difficult.

[1] Yes, there are doctrinal differences between (and among) Mormons, evangelicals and fundamentalists, that believers consider important, but to those on the outside, they seem to be about as important as the differences between various marxist-leninist sects. The world view is similar and distinct from those entirely on the outside.

]]>By: Gregory Deanhttp://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2012/11/mine-eyes-have-seen-the-glory-we-are-as-gods/#comment-48580
Wed, 21 Nov 2012 15:06:57 +0000http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/?p=19107#comment-48580I’m having a hard time seeing any position held by modern conservatives that’s rooted in observable reality…..

It’s not a case in which their religious viewpoints need minor tweeking to correct the brand. The entire philosophy is based on superstitions like lowering tax rates ; to a magical rate close to zero, will release economic prosperity and freedom. Based on what?…..a Republican myth of Reaganomics.

The list goes on to include environmental destruction, never ending militarization, idolization of concentrated wealth, nascent racism and fear of the “others”….

]]>By: martin morganhttp://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2012/11/mine-eyes-have-seen-the-glory-we-are-as-gods/#comment-48579
Wed, 21 Nov 2012 14:00:02 +0000http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/?p=19107#comment-48579Cardinal Bellarmine had the correct approach in the Galileo affair. In his letter to Foscarini he writes that Scripture is, of course, infallible. So if observations contradict Scripture, it means we do not correctly understand Scripture. Problem solved.
]]>By: Razib Khanhttp://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2012/11/mine-eyes-have-seen-the-glory-we-are-as-gods/#comment-48578
Wed, 21 Nov 2012 13:17:18 +0000http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/?p=19107#comment-48578#5, one thing about the al-ghazali analogy. islam is younger than christian. al-ghazali flourish about four centuries after the rise of the religion. it is not totally implausible that in 400 christianity might have purged itself of much of its greek philosophical accreta, with the earlier phase of church fathers being influenced by origen resembling the mutazili phase in early islam. as it is, that didn’t happen, and i have a hard time seeing how the scholastics couldn’t take the greeks seriously. greek thought was part and parcel of orthodox christianity.

some of the protestants during the reformation made a show expunging excessive hellenism from the religion, but they generally treated those who did go full-throated in this direction as heretics (e.g., deny the athanasian formula, etc.).

]]>By: Nickhttp://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2012/11/mine-eyes-have-seen-the-glory-we-are-as-gods/#comment-48577
Wed, 21 Nov 2012 12:56:42 +0000http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/?p=19107#comment-48577#3–Toward your point, the overlooked virtue of the medieval period is the fact that the Scholastics even tried to reconcile Christianity with the Greeks when they could have gone in the direction of, say, Al-Ghazali and decided that there’s no need to engage with the unbelievers.

And Razib–wonderful essay! Thanks for writing it.

]]>By: Razib Khanhttp://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2012/11/mine-eyes-have-seen-the-glory-we-are-as-gods/#comment-48576
Wed, 21 Nov 2012 07:22:36 +0000http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/?p=19107#comment-48576I don’t see a lot of sane in Erick Erickson’s article. I don’t see him holding a viewpoint that leaves a lot of room for the plurality of viewpoints that serve as the foundation of US civics. I see a guy who is fully denying reality and wants the US to become a Christian theocracy

i think you confuse gas-baggery for substance. though i’ll be corrected if i find out that erickson has sympathies with theonomy.

]]>By: DarwinCatholichttp://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2012/11/mine-eyes-have-seen-the-glory-we-are-as-gods/#comment-48575
Wed, 21 Nov 2012 04:55:28 +0000http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/?p=19107#comment-48575that modern conservative Protestant fundamentalism was the Christian orthodoxy for the past 2,000 years. It is not. It was not. True, there has always been a strain of Christianity which was naively literalist, but for most of the history of the religion the fixation on the Bible as science manual would have seemed somewhat strange, in part because science did not truly exist.

This is a key bit of history that far too many people miss.

Indeed, one of the various projects of Medieval Scholastics, in trying to reconcile Christianity with the Aristotelian natural philosophy of their day was to attempt to square the creation account in the bible with the idea that the physical world had always existed in its current form. In the 13th century the bishop of Paris tried to tamp down the debate by condemning the idea that the physical universe had had no beginning as heretical, but that didn’t close things down and Thomas Aquinas, among others, was open to the idea that the physical universe has temporally without beginning though created by God in that God held it in existence through his creative will.

Obviously, there were plenty of medieval Christians who did take Genesis fairly literally, but it was by no means a universal view.

]]>By: Tom Brihttp://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2012/11/mine-eyes-have-seen-the-glory-we-are-as-gods/#comment-48574
Wed, 21 Nov 2012 04:14:00 +0000http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/?p=19107#comment-48574Thanks Razib, this needs to be repeated.
What amuses me, and annoys me about my fellow Christians, is that young-earth creationism isn’t even particularly well-supported by biblical texts. The literalists are either dumb, ignorant or self-delusional. Fortunately I rarely meet these people in the flesh, only on line, so I can easily ignore them. The brighter Christians I associate with just don’t seem concerned about this issue, having made peace with science.
]]>By: Patrickhttp://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2012/11/mine-eyes-have-seen-the-glory-we-are-as-gods/#comment-48573
Wed, 21 Nov 2012 03:46:53 +0000http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/?p=19107#comment-48573That is the only part of his article that alarmed you?

It seems like he spends most of the article elaborating on how Christians are literally at war with non-Christians, all non-Christians are going to burn in hell, all people who call themselves Christians but don’t literally believe that Jonah was swallowed by a fish and survived are not Christians(thus going to hell and the enemy in the war between heaven and hell) and also that Christians are morally obligated to use the political arena(as well as others) to fight their holy war.

I don’t see a lot of sane in Erick Erickson’s article. I don’t see him holding a viewpoint that leaves a lot of room for the plurality of viewpoints that serve as the foundation of US civics. I see a guy who is fully denying reality and wants the US to become a Christian theocracy.